"An ally that can't escape! Driggs is a witness. We'll hold that fine democracy of the Argonne over your head forever." "You see," Wandel drawled, "that was bound to fail, because it was based on the ridiculous assumption that every man that fought was good and great." "I fancy," George said, "we're commencing to find out why we went to war--To appreciate the world's and our own astigmatism." As they walked back to the little house in Dickinson Street, Bailly tried to express something. "I guess," he managed, "that I'll have to call it square, George." "I'm glad," George said, quickly, "but you must give some of the credit to Lambert Planter's sister." He smiled happily, wistfully. "You know she's the most useful socialist of you all." After a time he said under his breath: "There are some things I never dreamed of being able to repay you, sir. For instance this--this feeling that one is walking home." "That debt," Bailly said, brightly, "cancels itself." His mood changed. He spoke with a stern personal regret. "You young men! You young men! How much farther you see! How much more you can do!" XXVIII George returned to New York happy in his memory of his intimate hour on a crowded stand with Sylvia. Dalrymple had given him that, too. It amazed him that so much beauty could spring from so ugly a source. He heard that Dalrymple was back from Canada, then that he had wandered away, pockets full, on another journey, pandering to his twisted conception of pleasure. One day George took his notes from the safe-deposit box and gave them to Lambert. "Get them back to him," he said. And Lambert must have understood that George would never let the Planters' money redeem them. "It's pretty decent, George." "It's nothing of the kind. They make my hands feel dirty, and I've lots of money, and I'm making more every day; yet I wonder if it's going to be enough, even with Driggs' and Blodgett's and yours, old Argonne democrat." For he had spoken of his plans to Blodgett, and had been a little surprised to learn how much thought Blodgett had given the puzzle himself, although most of his searching had been for makeshifts, for anything to tide over immediate emergencies. "I don't know," Blodgett roared, "whether this cleaning out the sore and getting to the bottom of it will work or not; but I'm inclined to look to the future with you for a permanent cure. Anyway, I'd help you finance a scheme to make the ocean dry, because you usually get what you're after. So we'll send Wandel and Allen and some more as a little leaven to Albany and to that quilting party in Washington. I don't envy them, though."